


Choosing; Being Chosen; Nothing More

by pseudocitrus



Category: Tokyo Ghoul
Genre: Angst, Family Fluff, Gen, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Touken
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-23
Updated: 2019-12-31
Packaged: 2020-10-26 20:30:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 5,227
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20748311
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pseudocitrus/pseuds/pseudocitrus
Summary: Collection of fics set at the end or after TG, posted (finally) from Tumblr. (Chapter titles note the ships/characters, and content notes/ratings are marked per chapter.)Includes:* Ichika, discovering her parents' kagune.* Ayato and Hinami, bonding during the end.* Kaneki, coming home for the first time from the hospital.* Ichika finds her parents drinking coffee.





	1. Reached (Urie, Touka, Kaneki)

**Author's Note:**

> i can't believe it's been so long since tg ended. :') immediately afterward i thought i would never write fic again and then ended up writing a lot lmao.
> 
> these are all set during/after the end of TG.
> 
> i miss using tumblr for posting fics; i don't use it currently. in an effort to keep everything in one place, i'm cross-posting stuff from there here.
> 
> it's a little bit of a pain to post a new work for every pairing (especially with so many rarepairs and short fics) so posting haphazardly to this one fic as i fix all the grammar (cursing at myself the entire way haha). i'll update tags as i go, and also list tags at the beginning of each chapter.
> 
> everything will be listed roughly in the order they "actually occur" in the timeline.
> 
> hope you have a good day ahead!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Urie and Touka, retrieving him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is a short headcanon from around chapter 161. (originally published: 19 feb. 2018.)
> 
> relevant tags: angst.

After they hefted Haise free, she collapsed backward, with…with what was left of his body.

Urie waits for her to stand then, and she does, to be fair, attempt it. Her arms wrap around Haise’s torso, tight, finding little purchase until her fingers curl into the gapes in his chest. For a moment it looks like she can handle it; but then the ground beneath them squirms, and she stumbles, and staggers, and falls, hard. Haise’s head lands and lolls onto her lap, and she looks down at him.

Normally her hair curtains only half of her face, but her expression is covered fully, now. Urie looks down at her and she does not look back. She stoops. One finger, with a broken nail, lifts, to caress his face. Her hand is shaking. It leaves a streak muddy with blood and slimy, clotted kagune flesh.

The ground squirms, again, harder.

They have to go.

“I’ll take him,” Urie says finally. He says it like an order, just in case, but she doesn’t protest when he lifts haise from her, doesn’t say a thing when he searches and then procures a cloth. Without a word the two of them roll Haise into it, smoothing down the tendrils emerging from his body, packing him into a shape that is much lighter than any body should really be. Urie starts to bring the cloth over Haise’s face but she makes a noise, and he pauses, sparing her a moment even as the ground writhes threateningly.

Her hand reaches, again, for his face. This time, she only closes his eyes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading!


	2. Hauled (Ayato/Hinami)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ayato retrieves him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is a short headcanon from around uhh...man i can't remember what chapter of tg.
> 
> weird how often kaneki is hauled from the brink at the end of tg!!!
> 
> (originally published: 4 july. 2018. whew!)

There’s no fucking WAY that Ayato is going back on his own.

“Kaneki,” he shouts, “Kaneki, Kaneki, _Kaneki, wake up_,” but Kaneki doesn’t respond, just keeps falling, just keeps slipping into the goop. It was a mistake, a miracle, that Ayato even spotted him at all — just a glint of blood-streaked hair, a pale thread unraveling in a maelstrom of bubbling flesh and unhinging jaws.

“Kaneki,” Ayato chokes, and it’s the last time he tries, because there’s no air in here, it’s hot, and he needs all his breath for himself. He’s knee-deep and still thrusts his arm inside the abyss, clenches his fingers around Kaneki’s, is horrified when he pulls out an arm and nothing else. Kaneki is brow-deep, now.

_No you fucking don’t!_

The years have cooled him, a bit, but he feels that old anger kindle in him again, a grit in his throat, between his teeth. He sucks in what little air he can manage, and dives.

:::

It takes. Almost everything.

There’s a moment down there, a long one, an eternity, when everything is dark, when it presses hotly, when Ayato starts clawing and kicking and feels only that he’s sinking, sinking, deeper than anyone can recover.

_I couldn’t protect you after all,_ is the wild thought he has, but then he catches something, a bone, or a gum, or, whatever, _something_, and he takes it, hauls himself from the river of bodies only to gulp in a breath and try again, one last time, to reach Kaneki’s finger bobbing in the churning current. This time, it happens. He wrests his arms around a torso and collapses onto some kind of island, some kind of palate.

The one arm earlier isn’t the only limb that comes off Kaneki and still, with only pieces of him, dragging the both of them to street surface leaves Ayato’s vision blotchy, his lungs burning. Everything collapses around them in hisses and screeches but still he fights to keep them moving, one step, next step.

_Fuck you,_ Ayato spits desperately, and, _You seriously think I’m gonna let you leave my sister and her kid alone like this? You think I’ll let you abandon Hina and everyone else? Fuck you, fuck you, fuck you,_ and then finally all he can think is, H_ome, home, home, home, home, home, home._

It feels kilometers away, but it isn’t as far as he thought. A beam of light hits, and then come the arms. In his confusion Ayato yells and holds Kaneki tighter but they call out to him, they pry Kaneki’s body away from him, and then they haul him too.

“No,” he says, “I’m fine,” he starts to say, but he finds that, in fact, he cannot say anything. They remove the mask — the air rushes him, freezing cold — he collapses, into arms, into a stretcher. People are swarming, around Kaneki.

“Is he alright,” Ayato tries. His mouth is numb, mealy. There’s chaos. A shadow separates from it, coalesces over him.

“Hina,” he realizes, blearily. “I brought him back. Did you…”

“Yes,” she says. “I saw.” She hugs him then, clutches him so tightly it’s harder to breathe now than it was in the sewer, and even with all the grime and grease on him he can tell she is crying, all over him.

In the state he was then — he didn’t get it. He cursed and thought for sure then that he had just been carrying back a corpse this entire time, that somehow Kaneki had exhaled his last and Ayato was too stupid, too blinded, too panicked to notice. But he gets the explanation later, when he wakes up.

“No…” hina looks down. “No, he…he’s still here. He made it. We think. Actually, he hasn’t woken up yet. We’re…still waiting.”

“Oh,” Ayato says. He leans back into his pillow, lets himself sink into it. “Good. So you were just worried about him. But it’s fine now.”

She wrings her hand. Plays with the edge of his bedsheet.

“Yes,” she says. And then she says, more softly: “And — there was just — it was just a moment, but it felt like forever…this little bit of time…when I couldn’t hear you, at all.”

He blinks at her. Eventually, she looks up, smiling at him, sheepish.

“But it’s fine now,” she says. “You’re fine. right?”

“…yeah,” Ayato says. “I feel much better.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i miss ayahina!!
> 
> thanks for reading!


	3. Held (Ayato/Hinami)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When Ayato wakes up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> originally published 5 july 2018.

When Ayato wakes up, his heart jerks — first, because of the machines looming around him, buzzing and fussing and connected to him by wires and tubes. And second, because Hina is holding his hand.

Not consciously. She’s asleep, in a chair beside him, slumped over his hospital bed.

(She was waiting near him, as much as she could. Everyone, even Miza, is busy, and there isn’t anyone much looking for her — so she has a lot of time to entertain the helpless worry that he might never wake up again, a lot of time to blink hard through the sudden onslaught of memories she never paid any special attention to before. How he always seemed to find her at Aogiri, no matter how new and unfamiliar the headquarters. How warm his coat was, when he covered her in Cochlea.

(She gathered magazines to read to him. She picked a rose and placed it in a vase on his bedside table. As days passed without him stirring she couldn’t help but take his hand, just a little, just in case it might help. It was colder than she thought, and somehow that made her tear up, suddenly, and rub it, trying hard to warm it.)

When she finally wakes, she looks at him with shock. Her hand darts back, to cover her mouth; her eyes turn glassy.

“Ayato-kun,” she gasps, and it’s a whirlwind then, Aneki suddenly arriving at just the right time, and then everyone else rushing to see him, swarming, asking, explaining. He still is too weak to get out of bed but Hina stays and everyday helps him with it, brings food and games recommended by Saiko and even some of the books Aneki clearly bought for Kaneki.

Throughout it all, he keeps a close eye on her hand, which never once goes near his again. But when he’s finally discharged, and when he walks himself out the hospital — she comes to meet him, to accompany him to Aneki’s new place.

“Which way?” he asks, and she replies, “This way,” and points. Then she asks, tentatively: “Are you…sure you can make it?”

“Yeah. Let’s go.” He was steeling himself for this moment, and still — he clenches his fist, and then loosens it, and then he swallows, and then, finally, he holds his hand out to her. She blinks. For too long she just looks at it, and Ayato wavers. But just as he’s about to take his hand back and somehow pretend he never offered it, Hinami grabs it.

Their fingers mash together; and then gently, softly, warmly, intertwine. His face is too hot for words. But it cools, eventually, the longer they walk on together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading!


	4. Home (Kaneki/Touka, Rated M)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kaneki comes home from the hospital.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> please note this is the **MATURE CHAPTER**. see the chapter end notes for other content notes for this chapter.
> 
> originally published 20 july 2018!

They convince the staff to let Kaneki finish his recovery at home, specifically, at their new home,  though really the convincing was easy because the hospital is packed; but even so, Marude eyes them with worry as he drives off, and they do their best to wave at him consolingly. Then Touka leads Kaneki in. He shuts the door, and then drops his crutches, turns, pushes her against the wall, and kisses her.

They’d been pretty good about — their activities. There was always a quiet hour, whether underground or in the hospital, some handful of minutes they could use to push close together, some handful of blanket they could use to muffle a gasp. Still, there was only so much they could do during those times and though Touka had (at the hospital, at his pleading) described their new apartment to him, he finds he doesn’t care about it anymore at all, except to figure out as soon as possible where the bedroom is, which they manage with surprising effectiveness given his staggering and their inability to detach from each other. They fumble along the walls, along each other, and eventually the back of Touka’s knees hit the bedside, and they topple.

It hurts. He winces even with that light impact, and Touka pauses, but he takes the opportunity to dive at her again, to press his tongue against hers, and she sighs, she melts beneath him completely in a way she hasn’t since that day months ago, that first time they were wholly alone, together.

It’s hard to say much, but she communicates it to him anyway, as her grip gets harder, as her thighs squeeze tighter — _You’re alive. You’re alive. You’re alive. _She’s overwhelmed; she trembles. He has more bandages than he can count and she is as gentle as she can manage and the sweetness of her caress, the sharpness of her clutch, both these things make him feel incandescent, and starving. He can’t taste enough of her, her smooth brow and soft throat, her every finger still a little raw from her digging but beautiful, beautiful, for how they hold him, and how desperately he knows they reached for and found him.

Their clothing rips, flies. Her jagged nails rake and he can’t help a groan that he tries and fails to keep quiet, and they have no furniture yet, the sound echoes. He pauses a moment, to gasp, to hold a hand to his head, and she looks at him, and he tries to tell her _It’s fine_, but when he gazes at her all he knows he’s saying is _I want, I want, I want_, and she understands. She pushes him, gently, onto his back, and his frayed muscles oblige. She tugs off the rest of his clothing, and hers, and swings her leg over his hips.

He moans, just a little, brokenly, as she begins to roll herself on him — not inside yet — just, letting him feel how wet she is, enough to streak his almost painful erection. The days of holding hands chastely at his bedside after the nurses left were all the preparation needed. She slides her body up, and positions, and then slides herself down again, with a thrust that pushes the air out of his body. He starts to arrange his hips but she sets her hand on him.

_I’ll do it._

He takes her hand in his, and grips. _Please, please, please —_

She goes — gently — then, when he doesn’t collapse beneath her — harder, harder — grinding in earnest, in hunger, in frenzy. Their fingers intertwine, knuckles pale and skin flushed with pressure, and she pushes his hands above his head, she kisses him and tightens her muscles around him and he’s a weak mess beneath her, a puddle of tiny pleads and sensation, heat and wet, perspiration, throbbing cock and throbbing bruises, even tiny scratches re-blooming on his face which become sparkling embers as Touka sips, greedy, indulgent. He feels her nibble and he almost catches himself begging for her to bite him, just to sate his desperate lust, his craving for as much of her as possible, mouth and soft insides and nails and teeth all, all, all.

It was never like this. He never needed it so badly, never asked so openly and got so freely. She drags her mouth in kisses down the new scar on his face and he lets himself have it, savor it, take it into every vein in his savaged body, every hollow in his filling chest. After everything he’s done, there’s nothing left to do now but feel this, the pure luxury of his body beside hers, and all its pain, and pleasure. He’s overwhelmed; he trembles.

_I'm alive. I'm alive. I'm alive._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ((content notes: blood consumption, kaneki is fresh from the hospital so all wounded & stuff))
> 
> thank you for reading!


	5. Surprise (Uta, Renji, Ichika)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Uta and Renji, and surprise attacks.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> originally written july 8, 2018.
> 
> hope you're having a good day!

Their surprise attacks and bouts of fighting is only slightly alarming to the passerby in this new age, and even less of a spectacle by the day. The two of them have gotten into a kind of boring pace, though, so Uta figures the best next move would be to really surprise him — see, maybe, if Renji will have rusted even a little — or maybe if he’ll be more into it.

Renji is later than usual to his regular haunts, but Uta is patient. The moment Uta spots him, Uta ducks out of sight to approach. He has it all set up, he’s running at full speed, the hit almost lands between Renji’s shoulder blades — when Renji turns and says, simply, coldly, “Stop.”

Uta staggers to a halt. He can’t stop his nice jacket scuffing against the wall. He has one dumb moment then, filled with thoughts like, _He hasn’t been fighting with me because he’s tired of it, he’s finished, he’s done with_ — but then he sees that Renji is accompanying a…a carriage.

“Ah,” Uta says. Kaneki and Touka-chan’s infant. He straightens. Clears his throat. Scratches his head, and peers inside, as if with curiosity. “Ah. How…cute.”

“Isn’t she?” Renji isn’t looking at him anymore. The baby’s hair is pale and fine and there isn’t enough of it to comb but Renji combs it anyway, gently, with one large finger.

His voice is feather-soft. Uta has never seen him this way before.

“Yeah,” Uta says. “Lovely.”

Uta walks the carriage so Renji can hold the baby in his arms, which he obviously wants to do. They go to the park. Renji is glowing, and too absorbed with the baby to notice Uta observing his palpable shine.

In the end, the day isn’t the same as usual. But somehow, it’s just as good.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading!


	6. Cut (Mutsuki, Urie)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mutsuki’s hair is getting long, and he hates it so much that he can hardly bear to think about it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> originally published july 3rd, 2018.
> 
> hope you're having a good day!

Mutsuki’s hair is getting long, and he hates it so much that he can hardly bear to think about it.

No matter how tightly he ties it, he always wakes up with it surrounding him, coiled around his throat. There are always too many spare strands sticking out and after a while he stops looking at the mirror. When they all go out for groceries he separates from the rest and lingers by the hair salon, but manages only once to actually enter it before he sees and sees and sees the bodies swathed tightly with cloth, the long and stroking fingers, the glinting and numerous blades. When he rejoins, Urie glances at him, watches him re-tie his ponytail as high as he can. Neither of them say anything as they continue back.

Maybe they are both remembering, how Sensei…

…maybe they are both remembering, how Kaneki used to point out his hair himself. _“It’s getting kind of long, isn’t it? Do you want me to trim it for you?”_ They would sit down, right there in the center of the kitchen. His fingers fluttered gently on Mutsuki’s nape as he secured the towel. Afterward, Mutsuki looked even better than before.

_“How did you learn how to do this?”_ Mutsuki asked after. It was just to make conversation, but his voice caught, a little, and he cleared his throat and rubbed his warming face.

_“Hmm,”_ Sensei replied. “Books?”

Mutsuki is tired.

“Wait,” Urie says, and Mutsuki turns, slowly. He has finished putting the food away; there’s nothing more he’d like than to return to his room and resume staring at the newly-painted walls. Urie looks at him. Mutsuki looks back.

“Your hair,” Urie says. “It’s…long.”

“Not that long,” Mutsuki says, somehow, through his clenched lungs. Urie hesitates, then reaches into the last grocery bag to withdraw…a brand-new pair of scissors. He opens his mouth, says “I….” and then stops, but Mutsuki can hear it.

_I was thinking that maybe — I noticed that you — maybe, but only if you’d like — but if it’s too troublesome —_

“Do you know how?” Mutsuki asks. Urie runs his thumb over the scissor blade.

“Just…videos,” he replies. “And, Takeomi showed me. A little.”

Mutsuki is silent. Urie clears his throat.

“Only…if you need it. If you want it,” Urie says, as if correcting himself.

Want.

“I’ll get the towel,” Mutsuki says. He ties it, himself, and sits on the chair Urie dragged into the kitchen.

At first, he holds his breath. But then he lets it out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i love the way mutsuki's story ended in tg...so much room for activities, from (hopefully) reconnecting with urie again, to however it is he got to be someone touka would call by name... ///
> 
> thank you for reading!


	7. Monument (Hirako)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hirako and the monument.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> originally published on tumblr 4 july 2018!

In all the chaos and fuss, Hirako isn’t particularly surprised that everyone forgets about Arima’s grave.

He never learned enough about anything to know whether there was some kind of family cemetery, but his investigation doesn’t yield many leads. As far as he knows, those from the garden simply evaporate after they die. His dog looks at him, and sits down, and then gazes at him from a head between their paws.

“It’s a shame,” is all Hirako says. He’s tired. It’s the kind of exhaustion that begs the simple comfort of going home, or…or visiting friends.

He sighs. He leans back, and gazes at the sky. The truth is that a part of him had planned it all out already. A certain cemetery, with a certain lot near a certain kind of tree. He couldn’t help but keep an eye out for it when he finally understood the breadth of what Arima was trying to tell him, he knew if there was some kind of family cemetery he would never be able to visit it, and he’s glad he did all the hard work back then, when he had the energy. The carved stone goes up, and his chest lets out a little.

He goes out of his way to tell Kaneki, and Yusa, but no one else. The monument is up for a month or so before Ui finally asks about it, and they go together to visit it.

“It’s so clean,” Ui remarks. “I guess if anyone will be remembered well from the CCG, it would be Arima. Well…he’d be remembered well by CCG, anyway.”

“It’s probably best that it remains a secret,” Hirako says in agreement. Arima Kishou is a figure not as easily beloved in this climate.

In the end, only one person manages to find it on their own, without being told by anyone. Hirako has no idea how. He simply arrives one day to find someone there that he doesn’t immediately recognize, and Hirako tenses. Defacement? — Robbery?

But she only stands there, and gazes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i love tg and have to admit that even today i'm not completely sure how to read what happened to eto, lmao.
> 
> thank you for reading!


	8. Real Food (Kaneki, Touka, Ichika)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Neither of them know how to feed Ichika.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter's contents: fluff, family stuff, touken, ichika.
> 
> originally published: july 2, 2018.
> 
> hope you're having a good day!

Neither of them know how to feed her “real food.” Much less what “real food” is, for her.

Kaneki pores over every parenting section of every bookstore he can find. But there’s nothing written yet for the child of a ghoul and a human.

“You don’t remember anything, right?” he asks Touka, finally. “About…how it was. For you. When you were little.”

“No,” she says, somewhat quietly. “I don’t.”

They watch her, shifting in her sleep, fussy, clutching her little rabbit plush. Ichika has been much more restless than usual; it’s time for her, probably, to consume some kind of solid nourishment, and lack of it maybe is why this is the only minute of silence either of them have experienced in what feels like weeks. But the baby took one whiff of synthetic food and made the same face Touka did when Touka first smelled it, right down to the disgusted glare.

“What about you,” Touka says. “Do you remember? What kind of…food? Was your favorite?”

“No,” he says. “Well — burgers?”

“Oh,” Touka says. “So let’s get a burger.”

“I…no, I was just…joking.” He grimaces. Nevermind. “It’s probably too big for her.”

“So? We can just mash it up, right?”

“No,” Kaneki says weakly. “That’s…not really the same. I…there has to be something else.”

In the end, they settle for fruit, despite the expense, despite the fact Kaneki can barely remember what each kind tastes like. They cut it up into pieces for her, they arrange them enticingly before her, they make gestures for eating and yummy but still she watches them and the fruit with wariness and suspicion, and holds her rabbit more tightly. None of these things are things she’s seen before on her plate, and she shoves them away, and Kaneki and Touka replace them, and she shoves them away again. Steeling herself, Touka says, “Look, look here,” and stabs a sliver of apple into her own mouth, and is so out of practice from these months of peace that she can’t help gagging openly. Ichika whimpers. She clutches the rabbit, and her eyes start to go glassy.

“Wait! Wait, wait, wait,” Kaneki begs hastily, and that’s when he thinks of it, that’s when he remembers it, a miracle. “Wait, listen, look! Look!”

He rushes into the kitchen, scrambling for a knife, and another apple, and a canned coffee, which he opens and hands to Touka. She gulps it, and then watches as Kaneki fumbles. Ichika, distracted from crying, watches with light sniffling as Kaneki turns the apple over and over, carving. He makes a notch, then winces — “No — that’s wrong” — and turns the apple, and carves into it again.

In the end, he manages it, somehow. He flicks away the last bit of red peel, and then unfurls his fingers.

“Look,” he says. “See? It’s shaped like a rabbit.”

“Wow,” Touka pitches in. “A rabbit! Look at that! How cute!”

Kaneki flushes, slightly. Touka is just playing the enthusiastic mother, but…but after so long, he can tell, at least a little, when she is mostly acting, and when she’s not. He sets the apple rabbit down in front of Ichika’s rabbit plush.

“One for bunny-chan,” he says, already carving out another piece. “And…one for Ichika-chan. See? Isn’t it cute?”

He places it down, in front of Ichika, this time, who doesn’t shove it. Her eyes are glowing, in the same way they do whenever she sees any kind of rabbit.

“So cute!” Touka says. “Hey, give me one too.”

“Oh, you want one too? Sure. Here you go. And…I’ll make one for myself too.”

He’s getting better and better at it. He and Touka cradle the rabbits in their palms, coordinated. They exchange a gaze that communicates, in an instant, what they will do next.

“Okay,” Kaneki says. “Ready?”

“Alright,” Touka says. “Look, Ichika, watch this.”

They wait until Ichika can see them. Then, at once, they shove the rabbits into their mouths, and swallow.

Ichika screams, with horror. She sobs, and sobs harder when Kaneki panics and chokes the rabbit out and mortifies her with the pulp.

Eventually, she loves to have her papa make her apple rabbits, and he loves to make them for her.

But it will be a while.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thanks for reading!


	9. Kagu (Kaneki, Touka, Ichika)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ichika discovers her parents' kagune.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> originally published 6 july 2018~

Ichika is a remarkably athletic child, and doesn’t like to be left alone, even if Papa is right there in sight, cooking.

“Please wait one minute,” Kaneki calls, trying to hide his stress. There’s too much going on — food warming, things boiling — everything is a mess — he’s slept for thirty minutes and all of them have been filled with crying and even now he can hear there will be more of it. Plus, Touka will be home soon, and nothing is done.

“Pa pa pa pa pa pa _PA_,” she sobs, in between Kaneki’s pleads of “Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, _wait_,” and there is just one pot left to take off the burner and his hands are full and she, she is climbing out of the pen, her body is bowed completely over the tall edge of it, and now, it’s happening, _she’s falling_ —

It happens before he can think of it. She screams as she loses her balance, and Kaneki lunges, impulsive, with the sound of his shirt tearing. His kagune fly out, a wildly desperate number of them, slabs that grab her, squeeze her, hold her aloft.

Her face freezes. Kaneki quickly sets her and the pot down, puts his kagune away, and rushes to examine her, turning her around and around, checking for scratches from the fall or from any barb in the rinkaku. He searches frantically for any place where her delicate skin might have been punctured — but there’s nothing, nothing, nothing.

He’s nauseous with relief. Her face is still streaked with tears, but her expression is alight with astonishment, delight. Her tiny arms are grabbing his, grabbing him, trying to see where his rinkaku went. Not easily finding them, she begins to squirm and writhe and feverishly whine the sound that Kaneki knows means _more_, and at that moment Touka asks, “More what?”

It’s….uncomfortable.

They’ve always been, and still are, weapons — something he uses to stab and rend and rupture, not something deployed finally as a last resort to placate Ichika’s impatience, dangling them overhead, letting her see them glimmer in the light before (with a held breath) letting her take it in her hand and squeeze it and then, of course, stick it in her mouth.

“You’re so tense,” Touka says, amused, and Kaneki shudders.

“What if I…I don’t know…what if I…”

“You won’t,” she says, and then she says, to Ichika, “Hey, hey, look here,” and when she gets her attention Touka lets her own kagune billow, softly, a light flare. Ichika shrieks with shock and then excitement. She rushes and tries to catch the colors emitting from her mother’s back.

Kaneki marvels. It’s a sign of the times that Ichika has come this far without seeing either of their kagune, though admittedly the synthetic meat isn’t particularly nourishing anyway, yet. Touka smiles as Ichika leaps up and down, then catches her and squeezes her, gives her a blunt but glittering crystal that Ichika carries to Kaneki excitedly.

“Beautiful,” he tells her, gazing at Touka happily.

After then — it gets easier, almost second nature. He tucks her in as he reads to her, entertains (and keeps her in the pen) while he cooks, straightens the back of her skirt as he buttons up her coat, fixes her hair, lifts her up as she wriggles happily for cheek kisses. Outside, with one hand in each of theirs, she asks for her favorite thing, which is for them to haul her up into the air over and over, higher and higher; but one day, she tugs at Kaneki’s shirt.

“Ka, ka, ka, ka, ka-gu, kagu, _ka_,” she says, insistently, “ka, kagu, kagu, ka, ka, ka,” and Kaneki, when he realizes what it is she’s asking for, reddens.

“B-no! that’s so — so dangerous.”

“What?” Touka blinks. “Are you saying you’ll drop her?”

“Wh — no! of course I’d never! but — but you never know.”

“Just take it easy,” Touka says. “It’ll be fine.”

“Touka-chan,” Kaneki sputters. “We’re — we’re in a _park_.”

“So what? everyone knows about kagune now,” Touka says, and he…supposes that she’s right. Still, he himself hasn’t seen anyone withdraw their kagune in public when there’s not a fight about to break out. He hesitates, but both of them are watching him now, with interest, and a little bit of pleading. Their eyes are exactly the same, and have exactly the same ability to pierce him utterly. He grimaces, and lifts up the back of his shirt.

Ichika cheers. He maneuvers his kagune to grabs her around the middle — lightly, as usual — and then, cringing, tosses her up, just a bit, and catches her. She screams, with delight, and he can’t help a smile, and this time tosses her a little bit higher.

It would be a lie to say he didn’t notice any looks of alarm, much less the shock, and whispers. But it’s all drowned out with surprising ease as she laughs and flails and laughs until she can barely breathe. Kaneki holds her out to Touka then, who takes her back, with a smile.

“I told papa it would be fine,” Touka says. “Right? Now, what do you say?”

“Thanks you,” Ichika says exhaustedly.

“And?”

“Thanks you…and…love you. Love you, Kagu.”

“Good,” Touka purrs. “Perfect.”

“W-wait,” Kaneki says. “_What?_”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> when i first wrote this, we didn't know ichika's name yet and i just wrote her in as "the child" :') thank you ishidasensei for that last blessed bio.
> 
> and thank you for reading!


	10. Harmony (Kaneki, Touka, Ichika)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ichika's parents drinking coffee in the morning.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> originally published 7 july 2018.

One time, she wakes up, hungry. After calling quietly for Papa and Mama, she realizes they aren’t there, and she heads toward the light in the kitchen.

It’s much earlier than usual. The two of them are talking, softly, and for whatever reason Ichika approaches, just as softly, and peers around the corner. They’re sitting at the table, together, and there’s the smell of freshly brewed coffee, a really good-smelling thing which actually tastes disgusting and yet is the _only_ thing really that Mama and Papa drink.

“_It’s okay that you don’t like it,_” Mama told her, when she tried it for the thousandth time and still didn’t like it. “_I’m glad you have so many other things to drink and eat._”

Mama is pouring coffee into Papa’s mug now, and Papa is smiling, and he says, “Thank you, Touka,” and she replies, “You’re welcome, Ken,” and Papa smiles, and drinks, but he was smiling too big and a little bit spills all over him. He coughs and wipes himself off.

“What do you think?” Mama asks. “Should we order it for the cafe? To replace the other one?”

“Yes! I like it a lot, I love it,” Papa says, “it’s delicious, you made it perfectly,” and Mama sighs.

“I guess I shouldn’t have expected you to say anything different.”

“I mean it. It’s the best yet. There’s — a little bit of sweetness in it — like blueberries, or chocolate. And, spiciness too. Like — cinnamon — and a little cardamom —”

“I have no idea what any of those are,” Mama says dryly, and that’s when Ichika rushes out excitedly.

“I know! I know what they are! That sounds soooo good, I want some!”

They blink, and then smile at her. Mama pulls down another mug and fills it a quarter of the way.

“You’re still going to hate it,” she warns, and she’s right.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> it's taken me a long while to have time to crosspost all the kaneki family fluff i wrote to ao3; this is the last one that was written back then. there were only a few of them in the end but it was extremely nostalgic and heartwarming for me to remember them and fix them up a bit. they were short, but i hope you enjoyed them too.
> 
> as always, thank you for reading!


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